


love ain't a three-way street

by trash king murphamy (blackmaggiecat)



Series: between you and me and infidelity [1]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Implied/Referenced Cheating, M/M, This hurt me to write, let murphamy be happy 2k17
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-26 14:41:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10788771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackmaggiecat/pseuds/trash%20king%20murphamy
Summary: maybe, in an alternate universe, where bellamy wasn't married, where murphy wasn't so desperate for love that he'd mistake halfhearted affection from the freckle-faced older infidel for something more, they could have had something beautiful, a love to last the ages, to put romeo and juliet on trial.but this isn't that kind of story.





	love ain't a three-way street

Murphy weaves his fingers through the older man's hair. It's curly and thick, and the gold wedding ring on the hand tangled with Murphy's other complimented it perfectly. This never really bothered him before; he had always known Bellamy was a bit older, six years his senior, and about his marriage, and it didn't seem to matter. _Age_ _i_ _s just a number,_ he had thought,  _Marriage is just a piece of paper._ _I know who he is, he knows who_ _I am, and will love me just the same._   

It seemed naïve, looking back. He had been a child to believe that love could be so black-and-white. This was back before he knew the difference between relationships and love, between being treasured and being taken advantage of.   

He wondered if Bellamy had been like that, once; if he had ever been youthful and naïve, and had loaned himself out to whoever would give him the time of day, like Murphy had.  

Bellamy was handsome, this was an undeniable truth. Despite being twenty-nine, nearly thirty, his face appeared so painfully young. If he hadn't known better, if he hadn't memorized every crease and crevice of his face, Murphy could almost mistake him for a man barely twenty-three, a barely out of college bachelor like Murphy. Sometimes, foolishly, he wonders if that was why he had allowed herself to talk to Bellamy in the first place.   

Of course, he knows this is not the truth. He knows that he was unworldly, back then, but not that badly.  

Bellamy's eyelids flutter open, eyelashes longer than Murphy's own opening to revealing a sea of sparkling deep brown. The effect was dulled by the bags beneath them; his wife, Clarke, had just had a baby, and it was keeping him awake at night.   

The mere thought of his wife made Murphy's stomach churn. He had seen the woman in pictures on his Facebook. Clarke was younger than Bellamy only by a few years, but, unlike him, she truly looked her age. She had the beginnings of crow's feet around her eyes, presumably from smiling, and the scrubs she wore for her job at the hospital did her no favors.  

He shook of the thought of the wife, instead focusing himself on the man in front of him. Bellamy's head is pressed against Murphy's chest, and he can't help but think that the man _belongs_ there. His dark curls look like they were made to sit against his pale chest. He wonders if they look this good next to Clarke's sun-kissed complexion. Probably not.  

He pulls herself out of his wandering thoughts as the freckle-faced man rolled off his chest, trying to sit up. Instinctively, Murphy reached back out, trying to make him stay, but Bellamy batted his hand away. Murphy used the opportunity to lace their fingers, and the corner of Bellamy's mouth quirked skyward, obligingly holding Murphy's hand. Something about the gesture made Murphy's heart flutter. When Bellamy pulled his fingers away, Murphy felt the loss keenly. Abandonment anxiety at its finest.  

"Coffee?" Bellamy asked, pushing up from the bed, the boxers his sister Octavia had bought him riding low on muscular hips, and Murphy nodded, smiling hazily. Murphy had met Octavia, once, in a coffee-shop back alley while Bellamy was getting drinks. She had slapped Murphy clear across the face, asking how dare he come between her brother and his wife. Murphy had no reply at the time, but even the memory of the harsh-spirited sister reminded him of who he was and what he was doing to the man he lo- well, the man he was having sex with. 

Murphy heard Bellamy hum lightly as he made coffee, Johnny Cash floating back to where Murphy lay on the bed. He snuggled back into the covers and watched freckled biceps reach near-obscenely for coffee grounds and the filters, which Murphy had placed on the top shelf for this very reason. He'd actually collapsed mightily off the counter in the process of trying to get them up there, and his neighbor, Harper, had come over to ask if he was okay.  

Harper was the only person Murphy thought knew that Murphy was having an illicit affair with a married man, a fact she had been tipped off to when Bellamy and Murphy had fought about it, rather loudly, when Bellamy announced that they might be spending less time together because Clarke was expecting. He could tell she could still hear the echoes of _"How can you have a child with her if you can't even be faithful_ _?_ _"_ and _"Why would I take your opinion into consideratio_ _n? W_ _e're not together, Murphy!"_ _w_ henever she looked at him or whenever she saw Bellamy thundering down the hall to the exit, her eyebrows lifting, her nose crinkling.  

 _Don't_ _look down on me,_ _McIntyre,_ Murphy would think, _you go back to you married, living parents, and your sweet girlfriend, and your distinct lack of abandonment and attachment and affection issues, but don't you dare look down on me._ He would never say it, but he knew she could see it in his face whenever he spoke to her, the same way he could see the disgust and reproach in hers. 

Bellamy brought Murphy his favorite mug, a blue one Mbege had bought him, full to the brim with plain black coffee, because toxic masculinity and dragged him this low. He noted smugly that the same disgusting mix was in Bellamy's cup, so at least they were both trying to be men. 

A lonely twink and a man who can't even stay in the bed of his wife of five years, trying to be men. Murphy could nearly laugh at the thought. 

They sat in silence, fingers tangled and not looking at each other, drinking their coffee. Then Bellamy stood up, and began to collect his clothes. Murphy jolted up. 

"Where are you going?" He asked, and Bellamy actually had the nerve to perk up. 

"I gotta run, Clarke wants to go down to the park with Aiden today," Bellamy told him, as if this was okay. 

"Wha-what?" Murphy asked, pushing himself off of the pillows but not rising to his feet. 

Bellamy shot him a sheepish glance. "Didn't I tell you about it?" He asked, in a tone that suggested he very much knew he hadn't told Murphy about anything.  

Murphy shook his head jerkily. "You said you were free today," he monotoned, fixing Bellamy with an icy glare.  

Bellamy stared at his feet, and that was all the confirmation Murphy needed. He _had_ been free today. But, like always, Princess Clarke had called. She had needed something. And Bellamy, his Knight, was flying away to do her bidding, leaving Murphy in the dust. 

"I'm so sick of this," Murphy informed him, and Bellamy visibly winced, "once, just fucking once, can you make me a priority?" 

Bellamy's look was incredulous, and he squared his shoulders. "I do make you a priority, Murphy. All the time. You have no idea." 

Murphy stood up, squaring his own shoulders. Fine, he'd play Bellamy's game.  

"You're right, Bellamy. I don’t know," he shot back, and Bellamy pursed his lips. "I don't know about you putting me first. It's always Clarke this, Octavia that, Miller this, Raven that. Can you ever put them down for a goddamn second and just be with me?" 

Bellamy glowered at him, and it was that fucking face. In any other situation, Murphy would be dropping to his knees after one look at that face, but he stood his ground. They were fighting, not fucking.  

"I was here now, wasn't I?" Bellamy asked, his voice gravelly and dangerous, and Murphy had to give him that. 

"And what are you doing now, hm? Running off to the Princess, to do her beck and call? Do you even have any goddamn dignity left, Rebel King?" Murphy bit back, and the comment had the desired effect. He saw, rather than felt, as Bellamy gripped Murphy's slender shoulder in a bruising grip, lifting the smaller boy clear off the ground. 

"Say it again," Bellamy dared him, and Murphy, for once, used his sense, and refrained. Instead, he leveled his eyes to Bellamy's, keeping his face cautiously neutral. 

"Is this the kind of husband you are to Clarke?" He rasped, and it was as if he had struck Bellamy. The man dropped him to collapse onto the bed as if he'd been burned, his face looking something close to terrified.  

"I'm-I-fuck, are you okay?" He asked, falling to his knees so they were something close to level, his hands glancing around Murphy's figure, as if silently reassuring himself that he hadn't fucked up to badly, that Murphy wasn't without repair. The cruel irony laughed in Murphy's face, but he just nodded. 

"It's not the worst even _you_ have ever done," he replied bitterly, not meeting Bellamy's eyes.  

The older man hummed sadly, capturing Murphy's chin in one tanned hand, pulling Murphy's mouth to his and kissing him tenderly, cautiously and something about it almost hurt Murphy. Gentle, kind, cautious was not something he had ever been brought to understand.  

Some part of him wanted to melt into it, to let it take him over like some born-again virgin. But though he had longed for Bellamy to treat him like this since the day they met, to bring down the older man's tough façade, now was not the time. He wasn't even sure Bellamy was the man. 

So instead of kissing him back the way he wanted to, he pulled a scarred palm up the middle of the other's muscular chest, and shoved him backwards. 

"No!" He interjected, ignoring the way Bellamy's wild eyes made him feel, "no, you can't just roughhouse me and abandon me and expect me to just forgive you!" 

Bellamy shook his head, something inherently vulnerable still in his face but his eyes hardened more by the second. "What do you want, Murphy?" He asked, and the genuineness of his voice broke Murphy's floodgates of emotion. 

"I want an apology, maybe? I want you to understand hat you can't just use me to get off and then run off to your perfect wife and have a whole different life!" Murphy near-shouted, rising to his feet, and Bellamy rose with him. 

"That's not fair, and you know it," the man insisted, but Murphy just scoffed. 

"Really, Bellamy?" He asked, exasperated, " _That's_ not fair? How about being treated like your dirty little secret, huh? How about being your shoulder to cry on whenever Clarke gets upset with you but you barely ever bothering to be here when I wake up the next morning? How about how I know all of your issues and every noise you make when we fuck but you never want to meet any of my friends, huh? How about how you won't even introduce me to your friends as 'just a friend' if you can help it? What's fair there, huh Bellamy?" He was shouting now, and he knew Harper could hear, but fuck Harper. Judgmental bitch. 

"Please, Murphy-" Bellamy started, but Murphy was having none of it. 

"Don't you 'please, Murphy' me! I'm tired of being treated like a criminal and a hand job whore just because you can't get your shit together! You act like you have some moral high ground on me when _you're the one cheating on your wife, Bellamy!_ You're the scandalous infidel, not me!" 

And that's when he feels it; Bellamy's fist colliding with his face. And this, this is what Murphy expected. Maybe not from Bellamy, but this was what made sense to him: violence. He swung his own fist out, colliding with Bellamy's nose. There was no crack, but he knew it would be bleeding soon. Good.  

Bellamy was breathing heavily, but Murphy wasn't done. He swung again, and again, and again, tears filling his eyes, some punches hitting and some missing and he doesn't even care, barely notices he's crying until Bellamy has grabbed his wrist and he's sinking onto the bed, sobbing and Bellamy is letting go and just... standing there, with that fucking look in his eyes that's too close to pity for Murphy's liking. 

"Do you even love me?" Murphy (shouted? Whispered? Asked? Demanded? Who knew anymore?).  

The silence that followed was deafening. Murphy's words clung to the air between them, trying desperately to pull the right response from Bellamy's hoarse throat. They made the air taste like desperation, like hope. 

Bellamy's eyes fell downward, looking at the green-and-red carpet as if it contained the secrets of the universe. "Murph..." 

Murphy bunched his hands in the cheap duvet, using all of the willpower he had to focus his burning eyes on the other man's forehead. 

"I-I love my wife," Bellamy said finally, resignation and pain in his voice. It wasn't an answer, not really, but it was all Murphy needed.  

"Get out," he whispered, and he hated the way his voice wavered. He could feel Bellamy looking at him, but he stared at where the wall met the ceiling, trying to keep his tears in his eyes.  

"Murphy..." Murphy refused to look, but could feel the way Bellamy's eyes were fastened on him, doing that stupid puppy-dog thing that made him want to fight for him. Made him want to protect the older man the way no one had ever protected Murphy. It made him want to give in.  

"I said get OUT!" Murphy shouted, eyes secure on the ceiling, and the dust in that crevice growing blurry from tears. "GET OUT, YOU PIECE OF SHIT! GET THE HELL AWAY FROM ME! GET OUT!"  

He wanted Bellamy to say something. Anything. To fight him. To fight _for_ him.  

Instead he heard the familiar _click_ of the door closing behind his... his what? His older lover? The man he loved? His casual fuck, with the brown eyes and curly hair and freckles and tantalizing muscles that made him feel, once again, like the gawky child with the wide-set eyes who still believed that he would find someone who could love him, who wouldn't abandon him? The last person who really made Murphy feel alive? 

He collapsed on his bed, sobbing in earnest. His chest was constricting, his vision blurring. His face hurts. Every inch of him is on fire. 

He feels nothing at all.


End file.
